Rev. Lauren Spivey Levwood

Reverend Lauren Spivey Levwood is an ordained Unitarian Universalist Minister in fellowship with the Unitarian Universalist Association. She holds a Master of Divinity from Starr King School for the Ministry, a UU-identity seminary located in California’s Bay Area. Rev. Lauren has previously served as the Assistant Minister of the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Richmond, Virginia, a large, 650-member church in the heart of the city. In addition, Rev. Lauren has served as a hospital chaplain in Fredericksburg, Virginia and Tallahassee, Florida, giving her a depth of experience in pastoral care. Rev. Lauren is also proud to serve as the Board Chair for the Unitarian Universalist Ministry for Earth.

In addition to her ministry experience, Rev. Lauren has a professional background in women’s health as a massage therapist and birth doula, and in the arts world as a modern dancer. She holds two Bachelors of Arts from James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia, in Dance and Interdisciplinary Philosophy. It was there that Rev. Lauren first fell in love with the Shenandoah Valley, and she is joyful to return to the Blue Ridge and minister in a community surrounded by these mountains that she holds dear.

Rev. Lauren is drawn to embodied and earth-based spiritual practices, religious naturalism, and experiences of awe and wonder arising from art, poetry, music, and the natural world. Raised Baptist, Rev. Lauren is comfortable with Christian theology and the ways that it informs the liberal Christian roots of Unitarian Universalism. She has also studied and practiced several world religions, including Buddhism, Judaism, Sikhism, Sufism, Paganism, and Native American spirituality.

Rev. Lauren currently lives in Stafford, Virginia, with her partner and co-parent, the Reverend William Levwood, also a UU minister of Accotink Unitarian Universalist Church in Burke, Virginia, and their eleven-year-old daughter, Haya, and black cat, Comet.